hello people! iv been searching around the net and have heard that there are quite a lot of viruses for Linux(though no were near as much as for ms!) soo i have a question, have any of you ever been infected by a virus on your linux boxes and also could some one please tell me which linux viruses are the most dangerous and abundant. thanks in advance.

flukee wrote:hello people! iv been searching around the net and have heard that there are quite a lot of viruses for Linux(though no were near as much as for ms!) soo i have a question, have any of you ever been infected by a virus on your linux boxes and also could some one please tell me which linux viruses are the most dangerous and abundant. thanks in advance.

been running Linux for a couple years now with no virus protection, and no virus infections. There are a little more then 40 known viruses for Linux, most of which where developed in testing environments, and none of which have caused wide spread damage. That is compared to Microsoft's 100,000 plus viruses, 100's of which have caused wide spread damage. Simply put, Linux is way more secure and chances are if you ever did get affected, its because you gave a virus permission to do so.

I too posted a thread about virus but was more about best way to do things and I know my best way of not contracting a virus, at first I felt a bit vulnerable because so many years sitting behind a AV scanner and linux you dont need 1, maybe a few people feel this way too

The Linux operating system, Unix and other Unix-like computer operating systems are generally regarded as well-protected, though not immune, from computer viruses, compared to Microsoft Windows.

There has not yet been a single widespread Linux malware threat of the type that Microsoft Windows software currently faces; this is commonly attributed to the malware's lack of root access and fast updates to most Linux vulnerabilities.

The number of malicious programs—including viruses, Trojans, and other threats—specifically written for Linux has been on the increase in recent years and more than doubled during 2005 from 422 to 863.